The real answer to how many reps you should do for a given exercise is.. It depends.
If you’re wondering what it depends on, then you’re in the right place! Let’s break down the utility of various rep ranges, and when they should be used.
REP RANGE GOALS
In a general sense, there are three main goals people are after when they choose various rep ranges. These are:
- Build strength: 1-5 rep max range
- Build hypertrophy: 6-12-?
- Build endurance: essentially as many as possible, exhausting the muscle
These rep ranges have some of their own distinctions, but they also have some overlap between them, let’s unpack each!
Building Strength (1-5 rep range)
Building strength is mainly about adapting your neuromuscular system to overcome heavy loads.
In order to do this, you must expose your neuromuscular system to heavy loads. Makes sense, right? Lifting a weight where you can only perform 1-5 reps is typically the range that will stimulate neuromuscular adaptations.
At around 6 reps and beyond, generally, muscle hypertrophy is stimulated. More on that in a minute!
Again, there is overlap, so you can build strength with particular weights at higher rep ranges, but that will also overlap with hypertrophy, and also eventually muscular endurance, rather than just strength.
Therefore, if building pure strength is your goal, especially with a compound lift such as bench press, working on progressing with heavier loads in the 1-5 rep range would be ideal.
STRENGTH PROGRESSION EXAMPLE
- Choose weight where you can get at least 1-3 reps
- Each strength training session (1-2 per week), attempt to add another rep to work up to 5 reps
- If you’re able to get 6+ reps, that weight can now be used for hypertrophy work
- Rinse and repeat. Add weight to exercise (could be as little as 5-10lbs) until you’re back to 1-3 reps, work up to 5, and so on until you can lift cars. Lol
- You can also do the same but in reverse. Choose a weight you can only get about 5 reps with, then, each session, add weight until you work down to 3,2,1 reps
STRENGTH CONSIDERATIONS
Never go into a workout, especially a heavy lift, with ego. Form is key. Before you start throwing around heavy weights, make sure you’re using safe and proper form for each exercise.
Training singles and doubles (just 1 or 2 reps) can be effective, but remember, the heavier the load, the higher risk of injury.
I personally start with a weight where I can get around 3 reps, and build from there, but that’s just me!
If you reach a sticking point where you feel you can’t add anymore reps, try adding another set!
Beginners
1x per week strength session, performing 1-2 sets should be ideal
Advanced
1-2x per week strength session, performing 1-4 sets
Building Hypertrophy (6-12-? Rep range)
Muscle hypertrophy refers to the increase in size of skeletal muscle.
In other words, getting JACKED!
The general consensus has always been that hypertrophy adaptations occur within the 6 to 12 rep range. This is a good start, but there’s a bit more to it.
Hypertrophy stimulation starts around 6 reps, generally, but the primary driver of muscular hypertrophy is taking the muscle to, or close enough to, failure. Failure meaning not being able to fully complete a rep, and close enough being 1-5 reps away from failure. 3-5 reps away for more beginners, 3-1 reps away for more advanced lifters.
What this means is that 12 reps is not necessarily the cap for hypertrophy. But rather, any number of reps can stimulate muscular hypertrophy as long as you’re training around 1-5 reps away from failure.
Therefore, if failure for a given exercise is 20 reps, hypertrophy can still be achieved by training anywhere in the 15 to even 20 (hitting failure) rep range.
HYPERTROPHY PROGRESSION EXAMPLE
- Choose rep range you want to target – 6-12, 8-12, 12-15, 15-20, etc
- Choose weight that you can perform with the lower starting rep range
- Each session or week, aim to increase number of reps by at least 1 until you reach the top rep range number
- Rinse and repeat. Either move up rep ranges with the same weight, or add a little weight and repeat the same rep range
HYPERTROPHY CONSIDERATIONS
Although you can achieve hypertrophy through rep ranges of 15-20, sometimes even more, a big problem with this is fatigue.
Simply put, the more reps you pump out, the more energy you burn through. Likely making you a lot more tired a lot quicker.
This can cause issues with hypertrophy as your cardiovascular system could potentially “gas out” before you’ve even reached the rep range to stimulate hypertrophy.
Making the set more of a muscular endurance workout, rather than a hypertrophy-focused workout.
That being said, unless you’re already used to doing higher reps, sticking to the lower, or middle, hypertrophy rep ranges (6-12-15) is a great start.
SHOULD YOU TRAIN TILL FAILURE?
This is a common topic amongst many lifters. Training till failure can be beneficial for a few things such as getting an intense workout achieved in a limited amount of time, or maybe trying to break through plateaus, however, training till muscular failure is not a “must” for muscular adaptations.
In fact, there are actually some drawbacks to it.
The main one being fatigue.. again.
Pushing the muscles to failure obviously means you’re getting an intense set in. The problem is that this has been shown to impact overall energy output, or performance, later in the workout.
Training till failure on an exercise can also impact your ability to progress on that exercise, whereas training a few reps away from failure (say, going at a 7-9 out of 10 intensity level) gives the muscles a great stimulus, but doesn’t “burn” them out.
Training till failure can be fun, intense, etc, and there’s no harm in doing it every now and then, but making sure you have room to progress on your lifts week to week, month to month, etc, will set you up for long-term success.
BUILDING MUSCULAR ENDURANCE
This is often the form of training that people gravitate towards when they want to get “toned”, or “ripped”.
In actuality, getting toned and ripped has more to do with body fat% rather than performing a ton of reps.
However, muscular endurance simply refers to the ability of the muscle to work for longer durations before reaching exhaustion.
This would, of course, be done with a lighter weight, essentially going for as many reps as you can.
Muscular endurance training is great for increasing the muscles’ ability to do more work in a given amount of time.
This can also train the cardiovascular system, as well as help to burn more calories.
Overtime, having better muscular endurance can translate to better outcomes in both areas of strength, and hypertrophy training.
EXERCISE SELECTION
Another big factor, next to your personal goals, in determining how many reps you should do is the specific exercises you’re doing.
- Compound lifts: more suited for lower/mid rep ranges
- Isolation lifts: more suited for mid/higher rep ranges
COMPOUND LIFTS
Compound lifts are those that use multiple muscle groups such as bench press, squats, deadlifts, lunges, overhead presses, etc.
In terms of strength or hypertrophy, these lifts are better suited for lower to mid rep ranges (1-5/6-12/12-15) because they can generate fatigue a lot quicker than isolation exercises. (Imagine doing 20+ reps of squats with weight on your back..) I mean, you totally can.. but that’s you ha.
As stated earlier, the more fatigue that is generated, the more it can potentially take away from muscular adaptations and switch to more cardiovascular adaptations.
Also, as fatigue increases, form is often broken, also taking away from muscular adaptations, and potentially increasing risk of injury.
Since compound lifts also use multiple muscle groups and joints, it’s usually safer to lift with heavier loads than it would be with an isolation exercise.
ISOLATION EXERCISES
These are exercises that typically use just one muscle group. Bicep curl, tricep pushdown, shoulder lateral raise, leg extension, ext.
These exercises are better suited for the mid to higher rep ranges (6- 8-10/10-15/15+)
Because these lifts focus on just one muscle group, and joint action, using heavier loads and falling in the lower rep range is not ideal, as the risk of injury would be higher.
Performing 3-5, maybe even 6, reps with a heavy load on, say, tricep pushdowns, would be putting your elbow joint in risk of injury.
The same can be said about performing a heavy dumb bell shoulder-lateral raise, the shoulder joint could take damage that could potentially prevent you from performing many, if any, shoulder related exercises.
For exercises like these, using progressions like adding more reps, and sets, would be better to do first, before adding more weight.
MIX UP YOUR TRAINING
Now you have some breakdowns of specifics when it comes to rep ranges.
However, because these categories have overlap, the most optimal scenario would be to expose yourself to all of the rep ranges, overtime.
- Training with heavy loads in lower rep ranges will help to build overall strength
- Training with loads and in the rep ranges to stimulate hypertrophy will help increase muscle size, as well as aiding a little in overall strength
- Training the muscles with light weight to exhaustion can overtime aid in the muscles ability to do more work – shaping better outcomes for overall hypertrophy and strength training.
- Mixing up rep ranges can also help to add variety to workouts
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
When I say, “all of the rep ranges, overtime.”, I don’t mean changing up what you’re doing every workout, or even every week.
The best way to make progress, especially as you get out of the “newbie gains” phase, is to (and it sounds boring) do the same thing for a period of time and focus on progressing on that one thing.
For example, if you want to get stronger on, say, the squat, you’d want to prioritize heavy squats each session rather than doing lighter weights, or substituting exercises like doing leg presses.
This doesn’t mean, however, that you should do heavy squats every week forever lol.
Instead, create a workout block that can be anywhere from 4-6 weeks where the main goal of the block is to increase squat strength, or whatever your particular goal is.
After that block, you could start another one that is more hypertrophy focused for legs, and strength focused for chest, etc. Then reintroduce heavy squats in the next block, as an example.
There are really endless ways you could construct a workout block, depending on your goals, experience level, etc.
If you have any questions about creating workout blocks, programs, or want a 1 on 1 coach to do it all for you, feel free to email me or send me a message on instagram! I can work with you!
PRO-TIP
Writing down your workouts and tracking your progress is also one of the most important things you can do on a fitness journey, especially if you have a specific goal for a particular exercise, or muscle group.
BUT WAIT, HOW MANY SETS SHOULD YOU DO??
A set is simply doing an exercise for “x” reps before taking a break.
Knowing how many reps to do is important, but so is knowing how many sets to do.
This could be an entire article itself, so I’ll keep it short and sweet.
STRENGTH SETS
Beginners: 1-2 sets per week
Advanced: 1-4 sets per week
HYPERTROPHY SETS
Beginners: 3-6 sets per week
Intermediate: 10-15 sets per week
Advanced: 15-20+ sets per week
ENDURANCE SETS
Beginners/Advanced: 3-5 sets per week should be ideal. Depending on experience, athletic level, feel free to add more!